Andi Dorfman’s forthcoming memoir It’s Not Okay will be published next week, and Us Weekly has an excerpt that confirms that it covers her dramatic relationship with ex Josh Murray, specifically detailing that Andi—like Kaitlyn, who followed her in the role as Bachelorette—dealt with blowback from Josh over her decision to sleep with the dreaded Nick Viall.

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A recent study suggests that most employees feel like their "authentic selves" at work after two to three months.

  Having just complained that Jessica Chastain left her nutballs in the pantry, or whatever, I should start by saying THANK YOU to Julianne Moore for picking up some of that slack. And congratulations to her for snagging that job as the new head of Slytherin. They could REALLY use someone who’s better at recruitment and hexing Read More ...

With most airlines now charging for checked bags, passengers frequently travel with rolling suitcases that push the limits of the term “carry-on.” Would getting rid of these fees (and the bulkier carry-on bags) alleviate the increasingly long wait times at airport security? Yes, at least according to two lawmakers.

Senators Richard Blumenthal (CT) and Edward Markey (MA) called on 12 major airlines Tuesday to drop their checked bag fees for the summer in order to alleviate long lines at Transportation Security Administration checkpoints.

The lawmakers contend in the letter — sent to American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, United Airlines, Spirit Airlines, Frontier Airlines, Allegiant, JetBlue, Alaska Air, Hawaiian Airlines, Virgin America, Sun Country, and Island Air Hawaii — that by charging checked bag fees, airlines are contributing to backups at security.

In fact, they say the TSA estimates that checkpoints serving carriers that charge baggage fees see 27% more roller bags than checkpoints serving carriers that do not charge such fees.

“We call on airlines to take a smart, common sense step to help thwart this growing problem: stop charging checked bag fees during the coming summer months, the busiest travel season of the year,” the lawmakers wrote to the airlines. “Without charges for checking their bags, passengers will be far less likely to carry them on, which snarls screening checkpoints and slows the inspection process.”

The lawmakers’ suggestion comes after the fight over long lines at security checkpoints has heated up ahead of the busy summer travel season.

Airlines and airline industry groups have put the Transportation Security Administration on blast for the kind of “unacceptable” long wait times.

Airlines for America launched the “I Hate the Wait” initiative earlier this week, asking travelers to snap photos of interminably long, seemingly unending lines at screening checkpoints and post them to Instagram, tagging @TSA in the process.

Yesterday, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey threatened to hire its own security staff to replace Transportation Security Administration screeners unless something is done to combat excessive wait times.

TSA, which previously promised it would to employ a number of measures to cut down on those excessive wait times, said it was doing the best it could and would address the Port Authority’s concerns directly.

Measures TSA said it would implement include increasing staff at checkpoints and asking Congress for more money to pay for security officers’ overtime as well as cover “critical short-term needs.”

Egg sandwiches and breakfast are inextricably linked—and since kick-starting your day right is serious business, it helps to know where the tastiest versions are found. [ more › ]

America's addiction to opioid-based painkillers and heroin just got exponentially more dangerous. The most potent painkiller on the market, prescribed by doctors for cancer treatment, is being made illicitly and sold on the streets, delivering a super high and, far too often, death.

We all know how this is going to end.

If every person you meet is given the same handshake and “how do ya’ do,” they’ll all start to blend together in your mind. It’s a lot easier to remember someone’s name, and who they are, if the moment you met them was more memorable itself.

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Jalopnik AutoZone Customer Takes Matters Into His Own Hands After 45 Minutes On Hold | Lifehacker Build a Truly Pocket-Sized Video Game Console with a Raspberry Pi Zero | io9 Watch Patrick Stewart Watch James McAvoy Shave His Own Head for X-Men: Apocalypse | Kotaku Disney Cancels Disney Infinity |

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It only has six signatures so far, but the night is young. [ more › ]

The state budget impasse is causing more pain for women and mothers, according to a new report. [ more › ]

This morning I rolled out of bed, shuffled to my computer, opened it up, directed my web browser to Us Weekly’s home page, and yelped at its latest headline. Jenny Slate, the actress/comedian/author whom you might know from any number of things (including her work co-creating/providing a voice for Marcel the Shell), is now dating Captain America himself, Chris Evans.

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Donald Trump Rift Not What Paul Ryan Needed In Middle Of 14-Day Cleanse

   Not enough credit is given to Christian Siriano for his willingness to dress every and any body type. Some designers treat that as an alien concept; he never does. However you feel about diffusion lines in general, remember that Christian was one of the first to offer real fashion to Christina Hendricks — who should NEVER, Read More ...

Kaley Cuoco, the Big Bang Theory star whose success I find baffling and hilarious and wonderful in equal measure, filed for divorce from her first husband, sort-of tennis player Ryan Sweeting, in 2015. Their marriage lasted just under two years and—if the tabloids are to be believed—may have ended due to Sweeting’s refusal to get treatment for his addiction to painkillers.

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If George Clooney Ever Says Something Racist, Use The Sliders To Turn This List Of 7 Reasons He Is The Perfect Movie Star Into 7 Reasons Why He Needs To Crawl Into The Ocean And Die

If Clooney ever fucks up, we’ve got you covered!

Following this morning’s investigation into the hurtful drama that is reportedly destroying the vegan YouTube community, Freelee the Banana Girl has published a new video. I figured everyone would want to be up-to-date on this.

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John Cena is back in his future forever home at TODAY, schmoozing his all-too chipper morning co-hosts and sending the home viewers into a fit of hot flashes not felt since the first bloom of menopause indicators. In the past, Cena has struck the perfect balance between helpful home tips, placating wine-soaked older women, holding tiny baby animals in his giant pro wrestler paws, and tear-jerking moments that remind you exactly why John Cena is universally hailed a great guy.

This week, Cena is putting his notable and, at times, seemingly unnatural strength to good use and helping to raise money for a good cause. For the past seven years, Delta Airlines has held the annual “Jet Drag” to raise funds for the American Cancer Society. The event sees teams of 20 attempt to pull a 757 jet 20 feet. The team with the shortest time gets to walk out the victor, but every team gets the satisfaction of knowing their physical efforts have helped in the fight against cancer.

Cena joined Team Finish The Fight to help pull the 167,000 pound jet. Though they didn’t have the shortest time, the folks at Delta crafted a custom-made title for his efforts in raising awareness for the event:

According to Delta, almost 2,000 people participated in this year’s event.

Photo by Seth Olenick

Last month, Netflix announced another season of its reboot of the 2001 cult classic Wet Hot American Summer, and although most would consider it a TV reunion of the creative duo behind the movie, in reality it's merely the latest chapter in an incredibly successful comedic partnership.

Writers/directors/actors David Wain and Michael Showalter first met each other at NYU in 1987, where they, along with nine other friends, formed a comedy troupe called the New Group (later renamed The State), that would lay the groundwork for the next thirty years of creative success. The troupe was eventually given their own eponymous show that aired on MTV from 1993 to 1995 and arguably redefined the rules of TV comedy by refusing to conform to SNL's sketch comedy template, instead existing as a platform for 11 distinct voices, and nearly as many styles of humor.

The State was ultimately short-lived, as the group left MTV to pursue a big network TV deal that didn't work out, but it was just the beginning, as its cast members (which included Ken Marino, Joe Lo Truglio, Michael Ian Black, Kerri Kenney-Silver, and Thomas Lennon, to name a few) forged collaborative bonds that persevered through creative differences and lasted decades. Tellingly, the show's Wikipedia page now requires a chart that plots the cast's ongoing collective exploits in a manner that's usually reserved for superheroes that appear in Marvel crossovers. Reno 911!, Stella, Childrens Hospital, Party Down, They Came Together—all of these are the brainchildren of State alum, and all star at least four additional cast members.

Writer Corey Stulce religiously recorded The State episodes on VHS in his freshman year of college, and one of his first interviews for his college paper was with three cast members who were then starring in Comedy Central's Viva Variety, the first of the crew's post-MTV exploits. A lifelong fan of the troupe, Stulce released The Union of The State, an exhaustive, 600-page oral history of the group's career together, last week.

The book takes us from the creators' college days to their current exploits, chronologically weaving together interviews with not only the entire cast, but also some 30+ other important players along the way, from their college roommates and MTV producers to Wet Hot co-star Paul Rudd. After collecting over 100 hours of raw interview footage, Stulce edited everything down into an effortless flow where cast members finish each other's sentences more than once. Their closeness and similar senses of humor is just as palpable on the page as it is onscreen—as Stulce put it when speaking over the phone with VICE, "11 different personalities, but one big, giant brain."

VICE: Can you tell me about your personal history with The State?
Corey Stulce: The State, the TV show, started when I was a freshman in college , and I immediately loved it. There was just something about it that was so surreal, bizarre, and slice-of-life that really spoke to me. I really liked that they didn't go the semi-traditional route of sketch with a lot of pop culture references. A lot of the stuff they were doing was very evergreen, which I thought was really cool and innovative.

Once I started writing for the college newspaper a couple of years later, Viva Variety had started, so I did a big spread on that and was able to interview Tom . So that was my first time interacting with any of them, and they were cool and really nice. As I went on as a newspaper and magazine writer and editor, I just kept up with all of their careers because I really liked writing about comedy, and just thought that it was interesting that this group of people kept finding each other, kept working together on different projects over the years.

What was the interview process for the book like?
I wanted to do some group interviews to see what kind of dynamic that created, but it just never lined up that we could all get together at the same time, other than when they put together a 45 minute set from scratch in three days before Festival Supreme in 2014. I was more like a fly on the wall then—they were rehearsing as much as they possibly could. The State is rarely in the same place at the same time.

But once everything got transcribed and I tried to whittle down what was good, it was just really magical that some of the stuff flowed together, even though I didn't have the same conversation with every member. I think that's because they worked so closely together in those early years, that even when they're just talking about The State, they get into that mode—11 different personalities, but one big, giant brain.

Was it always your intention to do such an exhaustive oral history?
I didn't envision this thing being 600 pages when I started, but the idea for the oral history was there before I even approached The State because I love that style of journalism. I love hearing the different voices and seeing the different perspectives, so I thought that was important because I didn't want the book to be about me at all. I don't think it would be nearly as interesting if I tried to meld my voice with their voices, especially with 11 main people in the group.

Illustration by Glen Hanson

What do you think kept most of them professionally close over the years? Is a collaborative circle that big and long-lasting as rare as I think it is?
I think so. There are certainly other examples of comedy troupes that continue to come together for new projects, like Christopher Guest's troupe and the Judd Apatow folks, but I really think this is definitely one of the most unique stories in the history of comedy. Where else can you find examples of 18-year-old kids meeting, forming a comedy club, having that kind of dedication to stay with it throughout the entire university process, thinking, Yeah, this could be good, we could do this, and then getting their own TV show, essentially right after graduation?

Then a couple years later, after being just chewed up and spit out of show business, essentially—I would think that 99% of the time—that would be it. You wouldn't hear from those folks collectively again. But the fact that they kept coming together for Viva Variety, Stella, Wet Hot American Summer, and all of the other movies and TV shows and webseries... I think there's a magnetism that keeps drawing them together. I don't know if I believe in destiny, but these folks were destined to be together and create comedy.

I'm astounded at how long they've stayed close, even more so after reading about all of the competitiveness and rivalries that constantly shook the group.
I think that's going to happen if you get a group of people together who are super creative and have big personalities. Of course there's going to be tension, and I think it only helps to make them stronger. They were all pushing themselves to be funnier than the person they were standing next to, and that's so important to them that I don't think they would've made it if they didn't have that. But of course, that's going to lead to tensions and fights and a breakup. I think it's sort of inevitable. If everyone just got along and made concessions then it wasn't going to be as strong of a group.

Back to the legacy of The State, the TV show. What do you think it had that other sketch shows at the time didn't?
With 11 people in the group, even if it was just a character piece with a couple of speaking roles and a handful of people in the background, they were fantastic at making those minor roles fully-formed characters. It wasn't just someone sitting there pretending to talk at a coffee shop. They took it very, very, very seriously. This was not playtime for them at all, they were hardcore and did tons of rehearsal.

Because of their background at NYU and not having any money, it was that whole DIY aesthetic where a lot of them knew how to do everything—they were writing, directing, editing, bringing props from home. I think that really showed. It was not slick, there was not a big budget, so the writing had to be really strong. I don't know where these ideas came from, or how they ended up on the page, but they just run the gamut of comedy styles... It just seems like they're constantly ahead of their time. It takes people a little while to catch onto the stuff they're doing.

Tom Lennon remarks at one point in the book that if the show debuted today, it'd be a much bigger hit. Do you agree?
I think there's definitely a larger audience for that kind of wide-ranging comedy that they do, and more opportunities to be turned onto that. If you didn't happen to be watching MTV in 93, 94, you weren't gonna see it. Now, all it takes is somebody telling you about it, getting out your phone, and seeing it in thirty seconds.

I think if they were the same group of 21, 22-year-old college kids who had that kind of dedication and had the opportunity to do a show, yeah, I think it would be huge. They were making YouTube videos 20 years before there was a YouTube. "Porcupine Racetrack" and stuff like that would have gone viral so quickly. But who knows, if they were 22 today, maybe they'd be doing something completely different. They wouldn't be thinking about YouTube, they'd be thinking about whatever the hell the next thing is gonna be.

'The Union of The State' is out now. Order it here.

Patrick Lyons is on Twitter.

Illustration by Heather Benjamin

The last thing anyone wants to think about on Mother's Day is the mechanics of how our mothers became mothers. "Too much Pinot," "the waterbed broke," "I knew from the second your father finished"—these are not sentences anyone wants to hear.

At the same time, as we get older we start to think of our parents as fellow humans with desires and needs, humans who occasionally get too drunk at a Stones show or forget to take the pill. Why not ask your mom about how you were conceived? You're both adults. Maybe it's a funny story.

I was recently telling my mom about an article I edited on the difficulties of getting pregnant through in vitro fertilization (IVF). Her response was that she could relate: My mom had to go through five years of infertility treatment in the early 90s, including four rounds of IVF. My parents were actually one IVF cycle away from giving up and considering adoption before my mom got pregnant with me and my twin brother. Before we talked, I had no idea about any of that.

"You had to be injected with hormones at specific times during the day," mom told me. "Me and your dad would be out partying, and we'd literally go into the bathroom or the back of a car so he could stick a needle in my stomach or ass. We probably looked like junkies."

Apparently, during their last IVF cycle, my parents had to rush to the fertility treatment while my dad cradled a cup of his dad-juice between his legs because they had to keep it warm or else the sperm would die. Not the most miraculous or romantic conception story, but I'll take it over not existing.

To celebrate our moms, their wombs, and the life they gave to us on Mother's Day, I asked a bunch of my coworkers to text their parents and ask to hear their own conception story (texting seemed less painful than a phone call). Here's what everyone's moms sent them in response. Love you, ma!

River Donaghey, Associate Editor at VICE.com

Lauren Messman, Editorial Assistant at VICE.com

Brian McManus, Special Projects Editor at VICE.com

Matt Taylor, Crime Editor at VICE.com

Kate Lowenstein, Health Editor at VICE.com

Dan Ozzi, Editor at Noisey

Follow Zach on Twitter

Still from 'Mad Men.' Photo via IMDB/Lionsgate Television

On paper, modern motherhood can seem like a raw deal. Infant care costs more than college in some states, moms are routinely shamed on social media for looking either too pregnant or not nearly pregnant enough, and America is still the only developed nation that doesn't offer paid maternity leave. But for all the economic, emotional, and physical strife associated with bringing kids into the world, few mothers would ever admit to regretting their decision to do so.

"Saying you regret having your kids? It just seems so profoundly norm-violating," says Robin Simon, a Wake Forest University sociology professor who specializes in the mental health effects of parenting. "I don't think that very many parents do regret it, in part because the ideology is so powerful. They don't regret it. They're just like, Wow, I didn't know it would be this hard."

Feelings of regret among mothers aren't just culturally taboo—they're also incredibly rare, according to one study conducted by the US Department of Health and Human Services between 2002 and 2003. Of the more than 7,000 mothers surveyed, an overwhelming 97 percent said they agreed with the statement: "The rewards of being a parent are worth it despite the cost and the work it takes." But the data raises the question: What about the 3 percent of mothers who disagreed?

"R" is one of those mothers for whom the turmoil of parenting far outweighs the rewards. Afraid to tell anyone she knew about her parental remorse, she turned to the internet for answers and in July 2012 founded a Facebook group for parents who regret having children. Four years and nearly 2,000 members later, she now knows she's not the only one who feels this way. "We get countless people who thank us for the page, because we are accepting, and we show the brutal reality of parenthood—that parenthood isn't just smiles and laughter," Zephyr, a co-moderator of the group, wrote to me in a Facebook message. (Both he and R wished to be identified only by their first names or initials.)

For many of the group's members, who submit their confessions via Facebook messages for Zephyr and R to repost anonymously, the community is the only socially acceptable forum to utter the kind of feelings most parents would consider unfathomable—and even online, it can be tough to open up.

"The parents are very nervous about coming forward with their confessions, mainly because they don't want their families to look down on them, or their children finding out, and having issues arise," Zephyr told me. Their anxieties are not without merit: The Facebook group has been repeatedly attacked, spammed, and reported by "happy parents," as Zephyr calls them, or people who see the page as offensive, demeaning, and even abusive.

"The comments range from the typical sexist 'You should have thought about keeping your legs closed' comments directed at the mothers to directed at parents about being 'doxxed,'" Zephyr explained. Others have threatened to call protective services on members of the group, based on their confessions.

When studying parents in comparison to their childless counterparts, researchers have found that "parents, and mothers in particular, do not report greater happiness, greater health, greater psychological well-being than people who have never had kids," according to Simon, who is herself a mother and grandmother. She insists motherhood can be an incredibly pleasurable, fulfilling experience, but "it's just that those benefits are elusive," at least from a scientific perspective. "It's very hard for researchers to put their finger on it. I mean, it's really sad," she said, adding that the lack of financial and social support for families in the US doesn't make things any easier on parents.

When it comes to parenthood, women can often face even greater challenges, in part due to workplace biases. In a study published in 2014, University of Massachusetts sociologist Michelle Budig found that women typically experienced a 4 percent decrease in wages for every child they've mothered; men, on the other hand, saw a 6 percent wage increase after becoming fathers. Not only that, but mothers are typically hired for lower pay and receive fewer raises and promotions compared to their childless counterparts, studies show. Researchers have dubbed it the "motherhood penalty." But for all the attention paid to the psychological and professional downsides of motherhood, very few researchers have actually investigated mothers who regret motherhood.

Orna Donath, an Israeli sociologist specializing in gender and women's health at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, is one of the few academics to tackle the subject. Last year, she conducted interviews with a group of 23 mothers, including five grandmothers, who all said they regretted giving birth. She determined regret by asking two key questions: "If you could go back, with the knowledge and experience you have now, would you still become a mother?" and "From your point of view, are there advantages to motherhood?" All of the mothers in the study answered the first question negatively, and if they answered yes to the second question, they were asked a third: "From your point of view, do the advantages outweigh disadvantages?" They all responded with a resounding no.

Donath says the study—and the book it inspired, Regretting Motherhood, which was published in Germany in February—isn't intended to be a generalization of all mothers, nor is it representative of an average population. "On the contrary, the aim from the outset was to sketch a complex roadmap that will allow mothers from diverse social groups to locate themselves on it in order to allow a variety of subjective maternal experiences to exist," Donath wrote to me in an email. As a woman who always knew she never wanted to have kids, she says she conducted the research in part to address the dearth of scholarship on the taboo topic.

"The existence of regretting motherhood tends to be denied and therefore, allegedly, there is nothing to study about," she wrote. But her focus groups prove otherwise, and the research has opened up the possibility for deeper analysis among larger sample groups, and at the very least, more open conversations among mothers about having regret.

When Isabella Dutton wrote about regretting motherhood for the Daily Mail in 2013, she received a storm of criticism online. The most "liked" comment on the article called her "an utterly miserable, cold-hearted, and selfish woman." Backlash aside, the article also resonated with parents who identified with Dutton's regret—and admired her honesty. A Google search of her name today reveals pages of blog posts, essays, and online forums from parents celebrating, defending, and pledging gratitude to Dutton for saying the previously unspeakable.

Others besides Dutton are coming forward, too. In March, mother Simone Chubb wrote an article for XO Jane titled, "I Love My Baby, But I Regret Becoming a Mother," in which she detailed her physically grueling pregnancy and her post-partum lack of sex life and self-confidence—not to mention depression and lack of sleep. As well, anonymous forums like Reddit, Quora, and Whisper are riddled with threads from mothers attempting to reconcile their own regret. They might discover they're not alone in feeling it.

Follow Jennifer Swann on Twitter.

“I’ve recently gotten pretty comfortable with the idea of potentially never having children,” my friend Seher posted on Facebook the other day, “Don’t want to force it and feel pressured by some clock, and don’t particularly want to be an old mom. Currently I’m in a grey area which is rapidly narrowing.” Seher is among several women I know trying to decide on the part they want to play when it comes to motherhood.

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Probably Illegal: This Man Is Sitting At A Playground With 2 Live Crabs In His Hands

If you want to cook chicken breasts that are juicy and tender every time, make sure you always follow this important step: Pound them all to the same thickness.

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Arby's Salted Caramel & Chocolate Chip Cookie and Triple Chocolate Cookie are new dessert options on the menu made with Ghiradelli chocolate and come served warm.

I paid $1.49 per cookie.

These turned out rather nicely, they were hot and crispy on the outside but soft and gooey inside without feeling undercooked. The crags and cracks in the surface of the cookies meant that I got a mixture of both crispy and moist in most bites. There was also a generous smattering of good-sized chocolate chips throughout for that creamy and thoroughly melted chocolaty richness.

A lot of the quality is lost once they cool down though as they start to harden and dry.

Of the two, I preferred the Triple Chocolate Cookie for a deep chocolaty flavor throughout that's enhanced whenever I came across a chocolate chip. The Salted Caramel & Chocolate Chip Cookie had its own draw with the chewy caramel but was just a touch too heavy with sea salt. Maybe salt flakes would have been better than granules.

Overall, Arby's Salted Caramel & Chocolate Chip Cookie and Triple Chocolate Cookie hit the right notes while offering a fresh-from-the-oven experience due to the warming. They're a big step up from the current fast food cookie landscape with a small price premium (the Arby's cookie is bigger but you can get more cookies at McDonald's or Subway for the around the same amount).

Nutritional Info - Arby's Salted Caramel & Chocolate Chip Cookie (94g)
Calories - 430 (from Fat - 160)
Fat - 18g (Saturated Fat - 10g)
Sodium - 360mg
Carbs - 63g (Sugar - 33g)
Protein - 4g

Nutritional Info - Arby's Triple Chocolate Cookie (95g)
Calories - 450 (from Fat - 190)
Fat - 21g (Saturated Fat - 13g)
Sodium - 370mg
Carbs - 60g (Sugar - 31g)
Protein - 5g